“I am a painter specialising in light-filled watercolours. I have grown to love the excitement of wet-in-wet watercolours and I now devote my artistic practice to this mobile medium. I create my portraits and landscapes using my ‘gravity painting’ techniques.

My painting practice began back in 1996 in Singapore. A collection of architectural oil studies on paper sold at art fairs and my 1998 solo exhibition at the British High Commission. I created a series of prints for galleries, hotels and Changi Airport and commissions followed from the US Embassy, Reuters, the British High Commission and British Club to name a few.

In 2006 I returned to the UK and set-up a studio/gallery in Bath. My oil portrait ‘The butterfly house’ made the final of the Holburne Portrait Prize in the city in 2010 and went on to win The Artist Magazine Editor’s Choice Award at The Society of Women Artists’ 2013 Annual Exhibition. By carefully controlling the way light falls on my portrait sitters, I create dramatic but intimate portrait commissions for families and individuals.

The subtle light of the atmospheric weather in the British landscape was also inspiring my artistic practice alongside my portraits. My painting experiments were led by my desire to capture the mysterious subjects of mist, rays of sunlight and glittering reflected light.

I now jumped from using paper (that I had to stretch) to watercolour artboard. This rigid surface helps me to faithfully record the mingling of my cascading pigments within water as they react together naturally to create delicate veils of colour and colliding effects. My ‘gravity painted’ landscapes sell at my solo exhibitions which I hold in October, as well as with the Bath Society of Artists in the Victoria Art Gallery and at First-View Gallery in Wiltshire. I explain my techniques in my own intensive Bath Watercolour Workshops, at art centres, art societies and in art magazines.”

We’re very much looking forward to Catherine’s upcoming workshop with us this summer when will see her gravity painting technique first hand!

To go to Catherine’s workshop please click here.

For more info on Catherine and her gravity painting technique go to https://catherinebeale.com/